Developing the use of administrative data on Scotland's civil society

Civil society organisations (CSOs) have always gathered and used information in some shape or form. However, on-going developments in modern digital computing, telecommunications, and mobile technologies mean that the early 21st century is bringing new opportunities and challenges for organisations seeking to extract value from the data they hold.

This Civil Society Data Partnership project is a collaboration between the Scottish Council of Voluntary Organisations (SCVO) and the Universities of Stirling and St Andrew's. The project is centred at Stirling, combining social statistics expertise in the management and analysis of administrative data with a track record of collaborative applied social science research with CSOs. St Andrews brings expertise in CSO management and strategy, while SCVO provides a network of CSOs and expertise in engagement. Significant institutional investment in this project from all three partners shows their commitment to developments in this field.

It forms part of Phase III of the ESRC's investment in the Big Data Network. It aims to develop the availability of administrative data on CSOs, while also helping civil society organisations to improve their ability to work with data. Scottish data, civil society and research organisations make a sensible focus for the project, since activities are substantially organised with Scotland whilst dealing with issues and resources that are of relevance to, and have the potential to contribute, across the UK.

This proposal focusses on Scotland for a number of reasons. The standardised collection of CSO data at the local level promises a much more comprehensive list of civil society activity than relying on charity register data alone would provide. Capacity building with the established network of Third Sector Interfaces (TSIs) (similar to Councils of Voluntary Service in England & Wales) collecting this data has the potential not only to increase data use amongst CSOs, but also to improve the quality of data collection as the accurate recording of information becomes more valuable to those collecting it. The relatively advanced state of administrative data linkage in Scotland (e.g. indexed health records) opens up great potential for the further linking of CSO data to other sources, increasing both the research and policy impact. Lastly, the greater inequality of both income and health between communities in Scotland than elsewhere in the UK (Morelli & Seaman, 2012; Bell & Eiser, 2013) creates a compelling case for better understanding how both civil society participation and service provision is distributed across communities.

The work will facilitate the provision of better data on the characteristics of Scottish civil society activity (including organisations, service provision, employment and volunteering) to researchers and policy practitioners in government, academia, and civil society itself. This data will be drawn from the Milo database of civil society organisations collected by local civil society infrastructure bodies across Scotland. Use of this data will increase understanding of how both civil society participation and service delivery is distributed across communities, and its relationship with inequality and deprivation. We will also develop the capacity of civil society organisations to make use of both the data they generate and the other data sources becoming more widely available, thereby supporting performance enhancements in service provision and organisational practice. Finally, the project will help to support collaborations between academics, public sector organisations and CSOs in Scotland to propose substantive research projects making use of this data that will impact policy and/or practice.

Who will benefit from this research?

This project has a number of beneficiaries. It will directly benefit civil society organisations (CSOs) and partnerships in Scotland, while further downstream also benefitting CSOs in rest of the UK and more widely. By enabling better understanding of CSOs at sector level and of performance at partnership and organisational levels it will also impact on service users and potential users. It will also benefit public policy-makers and public and other bodies working in partnership with CSOs by generating 'big data' and organisational data that will inform social and economic policy decisions and democratic policy advocacy.

The key beneficiary groups are:

Third Sector Interfaces (TSIs) who will benefit from having access to better data in local CSO activity; from being able to link this data to other sources; and from increased capacity to analyse the data they hold. This will improve support for CSOs, allow their resources to be targeted more efficiently locally; and contribute to understanding the state and health of the sector at a local level. Better data on locals CSOs linked with local area statistics (such as employment, deprivation, health, etc.) will help TSIs in engaging through Community Planning Partnerships with other stakeholders in public service delivery by providing robust evidence of the scale and nature of CSO activity.

CSOs holding data will benefit from improving their ability to work with the data they hold, either themselves or in collaboration with researchers. The links made to existing ESRC investments will help them to access these resources. Better use of data will allow CSOs to operate more efficiently, streamline service design, and effectively make the case for the impact of the services they provide.

Local authorities (LAs) will benefit from a better understanding of CSO activity within their area. Linking this data to data on LA service provision will increase understanding of the coverage of services across sectors, facilitating the better targeting of public service delivery resources to where they are most needed.

National policy makers will benefit from increased intelligence on the state of civil society, and being better able to measure CSO activity. Current attempts focus on using registered charity data, which omits around half of the total CSOs which are not constituted as charities. This will help the Scottish Government to better target their support of civil society infrastructure (e.g. TSIs); and to examine the impact of polices designed to encourage civil society activity.

These impacts will outlive the immediate project in a number of ways. SCVO will continue to make the CSO data available as part of the open data initiative following the policies and procedures established through this project. The training and guidance resources will continue to be available to CSOs after the project. Three CSOs will continue to develop their data research skills through the funded MSc places at the University of Stirling. The Network and community of CSOs and researchers will continue to run beyond the life of the project. The collaborations set in motion by this project between academics, policymakers and CSOs will lead to research proposals and funding bids which will support their continued development.

The involvement of SCVO in the design and delivery of this project will ensure that the impact on CSOs is foremost throughout the project.